13 Assassins (2011)

13 Assassins Synopsis

Cult director Takeshi Miike (Ichi the Killer, Audition) delivers a bravado period action film set at the end of Japan's feudal era in which a group of unemployed samurai are enlisted to bring down a sadistic lord and prevent him from ascending to the throne and plunging the country into a wartorn future.

This list started as an unfilled Word document saying “Best Movies” on January 1st , and it ended with over one hundred films that have been obsessively tweaked. There’s no ulterior motives and no efforts to impress behind the choices I’ve made. These are just the ones I liked a little bit more than the rest.

Not every indie flick people are raving about needs to be seen, and not every raunch comedy critics are slandering should be missed. You want to be in on the water cooler conversation about the newest blockbuster Monday morning, but you also want to see possible Academy Award nominees before your friends. It's a tightrope to cross, but we're here for you.

Anyone keeping up with Takashi Miike’s 13 Assassins should be thoroughly excited at this point. It looks to not only be an impressive take on the world of Feudal Japan, but it also looks like some of Miike’s best work to date

It’s really easy for a film about the samurai to be boring. Even master samurai film maker Akira Kurosawa’s Yojimbo falls victim to the period proving that even someone like him can make a movie that’s too slow for its own good. That does not seem to be the case with Takashi Miike’s 13 Assassins however.

You don’t see many samurai films these days. Akira Kurosawa basically built the genre in the 40’s and 50’s and film makers are still struggling to catch up. One director about to take a stab at it is Takashi Miike, whose next film 13 Assassins will hit VOD March 25th, and theaters April 29th